I'm A Libertine, But It's Not My

Anyone Who Has Obeyed Nature By Transmitting A Piece Of Gossip Experiences The Explosive Relief That Accompanies The Satisfying Of A Primary Need.

Each Of Us Bears The Imprint Of A Friend Met Along The Way; In Each The Trace Of Each.

A Scientist's Life, The Author Says, Is Indeed Conflictual, Formed By Battles, Defeats, And Victories: But The Adversary Is Always And Only The Unknown, The Problem To Be Solved, The Mystery To Be Clarified. It Is Never A Matter Of Civil War; Even Though Of Different Opinions, Or Of Different Political Leanings, Scientists Dispute Each Other, They Compete, But They Do Not Battle: They Are Bound Together By A Strong Alliance, By The Common Faith "in The Validity Of Maxwell's Or Boltzmann's Equations," And By The Common Acceptance Of Darwinism And The Molecular Structure Of Dna.

This Is The Most Immediate Fruit Of Exile, Of Uprooting: The Prevalence Of The Unreal Over The Real. Everyone Dreamed Past And Future Dreams, Of Slavery And Redemption, Of Improbable Paradises, Of Equally Mythical And Improbable Enemies; Cosmic Enemies, Perverse And Subtle, Who Pervade Everything Like The Air.

Did Chemistry Theorems Exist? No: Therefore You Had To Go Further, Not Be Satisfied With The Quia, Go Back To The Origins, To Mathematics And Physics. The Origins Of Chemistry Were Ignoble, Or At Least Equivocal: The Dens Of The Alchemists, Their Abominable Hodgepodge Of Ideas And Language, Their Confessed Interest In Gold, Their Levantine Swindles Typical Of Charlatans And Magicians; Instead, At The Origin Of Physics Lay The Strenuous Clarity Of The West-archimedes And Euclid.